Sealing Investigation
by IllusionaryNosebleed
Summary: A young man may soon see his lifestyle come to an end after acquainting himself with two mysterious people.
1. Prologue

**Prologue**

A young man stepped out into a street bustling with people from a bookstore about to be closed. Across the bookstore was a huge forest park that contained many mysteries deep in the trees. Nobody knew what could possibly go on in those trees. Anything could remain a mystery under the concealment of the trees. You could see couples go into the deep forest...and never come back. The park itself had lamp posts scattered around winding paved paths in the forest. Some accounts for people that were missing were simply due to the fact that they were lost in the forest. Nobody knew if one starved to death or was kidnapped. For sure however, the person was expected to be gone forever. Their cell phones would be left out on the ground, along with occasionally empty wallets and clothes. It was taboo for the town inhabitants to venture into the forest without at least a group of three, and the park was too densely covered for it to be watched over by law enforcement. As a white wisp was exhaled through the young man's mouth, he looked at the park with a knowing gaze. Every time the young man would come out of the bookstore, he would see the park, and he would remember words that he always remembered ever since he was a young child.

There were a few cars going at a slow pace in the white street; the drivers themselves were making sure that they wouldn't accidentally run over someone. Despite the pedestrians staying on the sidewalk, the drivers still kept watch everywhere around their cars. It was a frosty sunset that bathed the town in an orange light; signifying that the day was soon to be over.

As the buildings' shadows grew over the snowy sidewalk, a chilling wind came by and pierced the man's attire with a strike of winter. Wearing jeans, a black fleece jacket with a green shirt underneath, a red woolen scarf with tattered ends, and tennis shoes; the man only seemed ready for a brief period of winter. He crossed his arms; leaving his bare hands out in the unforgiving wind. At least he had no need for a cap, for his black hair was thick and messy enough to protect his head from the cold. Yet, he still looked on towards the park.

The young man started to walk to the left of the bookstore. Family stores and one supermarket on the very right of the bookstore were the basis of the town. With the night coming, almost all of the stores would close down. However, with a few nightclubs and 24/7 convenience stores littered throughout the town, the town wouldn't go completely dead as soon as night came. The man uncrossed his arms and put his cold, sensitive hands into his warm fleece jacket side pockets.

_I__ have__ enough_. With an assuring confidence from touching the familiar paper material of money, he walked towards a convenience store in a very objective manner. During his walk, he had planned out what he was going to buy from the moment he touched his money.

By the time he got to the store, all of the sunlight was gone, and the sidewalks were almost devoid of people. Safety was highly stressed in this particular town; one wouldn't want to be caught and dragged into the forest park. The man narrowed his eyes at the contrast of light the store provided against the darkness of the town and briefly looked away in pain. His vision strayed towards the foot of the door, which had two constant tracks in the snow with repetitive footprints on one side of the tracks.

_What __is__ this?_ The man curiously dragged his eyes along the tracks as it went across the street to a dark side alley beside a tall and white apartment complex across the store. The young man wondered what this meant, but it was definite to him that something suspicious was going on. His curiosity compelled him to follow the tracks and find out, but the young man felt reluctant to go into an alleyway, alone.

I'_m__ not__ going__ to__ go__ in__ there. __But__ I__ really__ want __to__ find__ out__ what's__ going__ on.__ I__ also __don't__ want__ to__ die__ trying __to__ be__ a__ hero.__ Who__ would__ I__ be__ even__ trying__ to__ save?__ Maybe __it's __just __a__ dolly.__ Yeah...if__ those __were__ tire__ tracks._ The man struggled to make a decision whether he should follow the tracks or not. He imagined a knife stabbing into his stomach; and next a bullet through his head if he stepped into the end of the alleyway. _I__ could __just__ go__ home. __It's__ safe__ in__ there. __Yeah,__ I__ won't__ have__ anything__ to__ do__ with__ this._

Forgetting his previous duty, the man hesitantly walked towards the apartment complex, which happens to be his home. He kept his eye on the alleyway as he walked towards the doors to the haven that would keep him safe. The young man wanted to be ready for any surprises that could pop out of the alleyway. Despite being alone, the young man could handle himself in a fight. That is, if the man knew he was going to be in a fight. Each step the young man took towards his home only made him more nervous. He had a yearning to find the source of these mysterious tracks, yet his sense of safety held him back. He knew full well that it could be something that he would regret; but at least it preserved his life in the best way possible. _Just__ go__ to __sleep__ when__ you__ get __to __your __apartment.__ You__ will__ be__ fine._ The young man tried to deceive himself even though he would be up all night in his bed, trying to think about what happened to the person in the alleyway. The true cause would be forever unknown to him, and it could torment him for a while. It may turn him insane and his attention would be directed away from more important matters in his life. _I __just__ can't..._

The young man stood still, facing the safe haven he labeled himself. With each moment, the man grew more restless and afraid. _Someone __could __be __watching __me__ reading __those __tracks__ and __might __slit __me__ in__ my__ throat __tonight!_ _Or__ I __might__ get__ dragged__ to__ the __same__ alley way!__ Or__ I__ could __be__ dragged__ into __the __forest!__ I__ could __get..._

The convenience door opened with the sound of a chiming bell. This made the young man gasp and quickly twirl around. _SHIT!_ His vision became all a blur as it soon faced the sky. He felt a sudden chill to his entire back as he lied on the snow. He drew in short breathes while he quickly sat up, supporting himself with his hands. His heart pounded as his vision came back to normal. The young man, all of a sudden, saw someone rushing towards him. _Who__ are__ you?_

In a loud yet breathless voice, he made his thought clear as he panted. His eyes widened before he was able to examine the figure that came up to his feet. _Wait, __it's__ not __killing__ me.__ Or__ she__ isn't.__ Who __is__ she?_

The young woman brought out her hand to the young man, motioning for him to get up. The young woman wore a white dress coat with a band around her left sleeve. She donned a black hat and had a brown book by her side. The young man reluctantly brought out his hand and clasped the hand held towards him. As she pulled him up, she immediately asked in an urgent manner,

"Help me!"


	2. Prologue Part 2

Prologue Part 2

"What?" breathed the young man as he got back on his feet. Yet, he knew exactly the words the brunette said to him. What escaped his mind was the reason behind those words. This didn't prevent him from pondering it; for he was already singling out the most plausible reason from the others. When the young man looked at the brunette; she glared expectantly into his eyes. He averted his eyes away to the ground, pretending to rub them. He faced the one idea that must be the reason for the brunette's plea.

"Uhmmm..." the young man hesitated. He struggled to form together a coherent sentence that seemed right for the situation. "How can I assist you?" As he spoke that sentence deliberately, he slowly looked back up at the brunette's face. As he finished, the young man cursed himself for only being able to come up with that phrase. He was only rewarded, or rather punished, with the imposing stare-down he received from the woman. The young man felt as if a bolt of lightning was about to strike him down for wording his reply wrong.

The brunette continued her unflinching and menacing glare, but then she gestured at the snow-tracked ground with a point of her finger. The young man quickly looked where she pointed. He seemed more willing to stop looking straight into the brunette's eyes than to follow her finger's direction. _She didn't even tell me what's going on! But I know that it has something to do with these tracks...that lead into the alleyway._

"Is your friend missing?" directly asked the young man, peering with his eyes to see that the brunette nodded. He felt uneasy at asking a frank question like that to a silent yet demanding woman, but at least he finally found out the reason for her plea. _So it was true...her friend's been kidnapped. I don't think it's still safe to go in there, even if she came along._

_Yeah, I think I'm going to play it safe. It'll be hard for me to keep going like this if I got hurt._ Inclined to take a safer route, the young man said "well...uhhhhh...let's call the police. The store behind you should have a phone there." He brought his hand to his chin and looked down at the tracks in the snow. "Maybe they'll get here fast enough and we can save your friend. At least they're more willing to do justice here than to-."

The brunette had enough of it. She stamped off towards the alleyway, catching the young man's attention. _Hey, what are you doi-..HEY!_

She grabbed one of the young man's wrists and pulled with a tight grip towards the place that the young man feared. She didn't seem to care that the young man was reluctant to help her out as she pushed on in her objective gait.

_Let go of me!_ While he was being jerked, the young man suddenly felt wronged. He wanted to retreat to his seemingly safe fortress of a locked apartment; yet something primal was slowly swaying him. Even before he met the brunette, he felt prodded from the inside to rend justice on a possible evil-doer in a dark place. A reckless, instinctive desire that failed to empower the young man with confidence earlier. Soon, that desire clearly won.

The young man released himself free from the brunette's grasp by shirking his wrist out of her hand. The brunette spun around and glared at the young man again. They were only a few feet away from entering the alleyway. The young man glared back without aversion; he wasn't dominated by her anymore.

"If you insist, I'll help you" said the young man fearlessly, confident in his statement. The young woman's glare had lightened its weight on the young man, as she smirked a little bit before turning around. The young man felt jubilant at finally overpowering the cold gaze. But that soon dissipated when he founded himself in the same place he wanted to avoid.

_I can't turn back, can I?_ Caught between a rock and a hard place, the young man followed the brunette through the alleyway. _Do you want to get killed?_ Still feeling emboldened, the young man felt that he should be the one in the front and not cowering in the back. Yet, the young man still kept his distance of a couple of paces from the brunette. He wasn't willing to offer his life for a stranger who employed force on an innocent bystander. He preoccupied himself by inspecting every snow print and brick in the alleyway in order to satisfy his paranoia.

_If a random person tries to come out and jump us, then it will be two versus one. That young woman felt pretty tough when she grappled me. If that person had a gun, only one of us would get shot. And it's not like anyone wouldn't hear a rumble in this place. She might be one of those loud and shrill screamers so help might be easier to get. Yeah! We're in society right now. It's not like we got lost in that park. If a scary group comes out, I could just turn around and run for my life while the young woman distracts them. They might be more attracted to her than to me. Aha! And the phone is over there too with another guy just in case they come for me! So even calling the police would even-  
><em>  
>While they were walking, the brunette immediately looked up to the sky. "6:46 PM, Cherry Apartments alleyway" said the young woman to herself, catching the curiosity of the young man. <em>What was that? How does she know this? Does she live in the same place I do? Does she have a watch under her sleeve?<em>

The young man walked closer to the brunette and was about to open his mouth when the brunette said "Shhhh~, I think we're here." _What? Do you think you know everything? Are you leading me to a trap?_ Nevertheless, the young man became silent and obeyed the brunette stranger.

They were at the end of the alleyway where the tracks have stopped at an old wooden door with a rusted brass doorknob. A couple of beer bottles lay entrenched in the snow beside the tracks. There was a bucket filled with cigarette butts on the other side of the tracks. Both the young man and the brunette line up beside the door with the woman in the front. The suspected location didn't take as long as what the young man had anticipated. _That wasn't so bad, but where is this? What is this building supposed to be? Why is she still…_

All of a sudden, murmurs were heard from inside the building. They both lit up in surprise as they pressed their ears against the brick wall even more. _There's people inside, now what do we,,,hey, what do you think you're doing?_

The young man watched the young woman bringing her arm out to her front. He leaned his head out to see what the young woman was doing while no longer paying any attention to the mysterious murmurs inside. The brunette had her hand on the doorknob as she deliberately and slowly turned it to muffle the clicking sounds from the lock. _It was unlocked? Wait a minute..._

He circled to the side of the brunette to see her hand no longer turning the doorknob, yet her wrist was twisted upwards. _Are you sure you want to be the one that opens the door? Hell, why would a kidnapper leave the door unlocked? Could this be a big misunderstanding? That would mean this was all a waste of my time. What a crazy woman. At this point, her friend could already be deep in the park or somewhere distant. But...  
><em>  
>The young man traced his memories back to before he entered the alleyway, and even before he met the brunette. <em>No, those tracks only led into the alleyway. That means that the kidnapper is really stupid. <em>He looked at the green beer bottles in the snow beside the door. _He might be drunk. But, a silent and drunken man? How was this possible?_

He looked back up towards the door. The brunette remained still with her hand ready to push the door open. Yet, she continued to wait as she peered down at her own hand, then she looked at the young man with a reluctant gaze. The young man became troubled when the brunette gazed at him and looked towards the sky. He dug his hands in his jacket pockets and silently shuffled his shoes on the ground.

_Don't look at me like that. Aren't you supposed to be the one leading this? You're the impatient one who just walked into the alleyway like everything's a-okay. I mean...if even you're scared, what the hell are you going to expect me to do? I might just abandon you. Nobody will know that we met, and I may have a guilty conscious for a little while. But life goes on, right? Someday, I'll just forget and be on my merry way._

_Of course, I should be the one with my hand on the doorknob; not her. Our roles have flipped here, but it's not like anyone else is here to see it but us and possibly the kidnappers. Anything that happens in the near future to us would only be remembered by us. No one knows that the girl wanting to rescue her friend is having second thoughts. No one else is there to know about it. While it's nice to be this anonymous, it's just too...sec-_

A loud scream suddenly shrilled through the walls. It made both the young man and the brunette jump as they fully digested the piercing cry in their brains. The brunette immediately pushed the door open with the doorknob already turned by her hand. Luckily, the door was devoid of creaking noises as the young man got closer to the entrance into the mysterious building beside the young woman. They both peered in with their heads leaned over. Then they suddenly became horrified at what they were seeing. The young man's wide open mouth shook while the young woman narrowed her eyes. _Oh...my god. This room...  
><em>  
>"Aww~, be quiet, won't yousss" slurred a maddened voice. The doorway led to a single and dirty room with two mattresses on the floor and one bed with a dangling bright ceiling lamp above it. Everywhere else in the room was very dark other than the bed with the lamp. Two women lied on each one of the mattresses knocked-out with their clothes wrinkled. There was one rag towel on each mattress right next to their faces. An opaque brown bottle was in front of one of the mattresses.<p>

A black-haired sweaty woman in white and blue lingerie was strapped to the bed with rope. As the lamp swayed side to side above her; her wrists and ankles were tied to small wooden pillars at each corner of the bed. She cried loudly while she violently struggled with her medium-sized breasts shaking along with her. Unfortunately, the knots on the ropes were tight and would require uninterrupted attention to untie. There was a reddened mark on her left cheek. The young man had his attention focused onto her; part of his vision of her was blocked by a man who was almost a hulk.

A giant man with nothing but blue boxers stood in front of the woman's legs that were spread to completely reveal the blue and white panty. The blue boxers had a large extension coming from the gentleman's area with an accompaniment of a perverse expression on the giant's face. He stepped forward and placed his hand on the panty. He gently rubbed it as the woman unconsciously and uncomfortably moaned as she cried. He then placed both of his hands on her legs and placed his branch on the panty. He made slow and steady pelvic thrusts as cotton slid in and out of satin.

"Stop it! Please, ohh~, stop it! I...I mean it!" desperately cried the young woman while she suffered the clothed sexual advances. She became even sweatier and the breasts became perky underneath the bra. A wave of despair and hopelessness washed her body. She wasn't waiting for a miracle to happen; she was waiting for the nightmare to end.

"No no, my dear~" responded the giant while continuing his pelvic thrusts. "Just wait~. You wills an-joy it. But somethings...are in dehh way." The giant slowly laughed to himself as he rolled his eyes up in pleasure.

Clong! The sound of a metal pipe hitting the head resounded through the room as the giant soon stopped his thrusts. The woman even soon stopped tearing up to wonder who was challenging the monstrosity in front of her. The giant's perverse smile remained, but his eyebrows began to slant. He slowly turned around to see the young man poised with a pipe in his hand.

The young man stood with horror staring up at the giant's gleeful yet almost evil expression. _What...are you? Are you really so drunk that..._

The young man suddenly noticed the giant's body being slowly twisted sideways. He quickly ducked down to feel a large fist grazing his hair. The young man was almost caught in a haymaker. While ducking down, the young man became disgusted at the sight of seeing a fabric-covered extension in front of his face. Becoming slightly distracted, the young man was suddenly picked up in the air by the collar of his shirt. The giant brought his grappling side of the body backwards before lunging it forward, throwing the young man towards the wall.

Bam! The young man had hit the wall with his back and slid down to the floor. The young man breathed heavily as some of his air was knocked out of him. The giant moved towards the young man with increasing speed. The young man began to brace himself against the wall when he noticed the giant charging towards him like a truck at full speed. He rolled out of the way as the giant elbow charged into the wall. The elbow broke through the wall, which unaffected the giant.

The young man rolled into a pile of green beer bottles as they clanked against each other, signifying that the young man was there. The giant stared him down as he began to get his elbow out by pushing against the wall. The young man slipped up a few times on his feet while grabbing a beer bottle as the giant got his elbow out of the wall. Finally getting his feet firmly on the ground, he threw it at the giant while running away from him.

The giant watched with his narrowed eyes the beer bottle that harmlessly bumped his body and fell down with a ping to his feet. Soon, he cackled menacingly at how weak the throw was. _You're sick._ The young man became even more disgusted with him while he frantically looked around the room.

_There's no way I could use my fists against him. If his elbow got caught in the wall, then my fists will do nothing but tickle him. Isn't there something here I could use as a weapon? There isn't a bottle around me that I could crack open. A-ha! A knife! I hope its sharp enough for even him!  
><em>  
>There was a plate with yellow bones on the ground with a serrated steak knife beside the young man. The blade itself was covered with blood and fur. The young man quickly leaned over and grabbed it while slightly retching at the material the blade had. He wasn't willing enough to clean it off to reveal the blade underneath. <em>Now how should I approach him? If I attack him from the front, I'm going to get knocked out. I need to maneuver around him...<em>

The giant was still laughing while he stared gleefully at the young man. His smile had gotten bigger when he noticed the young man charging towards him. Even in his drunken state of mind, the giant knew that the puny man had to be stupid and was going to pay for it. He slowly brought out his hands preparing for the young man to try to strike him at the gut. As soon as the young man was a foot away from the giant, the colossus thrust forward his hand to try to grab the puny one again. But at the last second, the young man suddenly twirled to his left as he missed his grapple. Then the giant suddenly felt something embedded around his left ankle.

The young man had stabbed the Achilles' tendon of the giant's left leg. Using both of his hands, he tried to slide the knife upwards to slice the entire leg to immobilize him. Unfortunately, the knife got too far deep into the bone to move anywhere else but out. It became far too late for the young man to realize it before he was suddenly grabbed on the back of his jacket by the giant. The giant swung over the young man to his front as he brought his head backwards. The young man looked downwards, seeing himself floating off the ground. The giant soon began to bring his head forward in the form of a head-butt.

The young man noticed that his jacket was unzipped while looking down. He quickly brought his arms up, causing him to slide out of his sleeves into the ground. This left the giant to head-butt nothing while holding up a jacket. The giant stared at where the young man used to be before he slowly looked around in front of him. There was again no sign of the young man. Suddenly, he felt a kick behind his knee while the object in his ankle was shanked out. He collapsed to the ground on his knees and dropped the jacket. His gleeful smile became replaced by a complete contortion of his face tinted with redness and rage. He never had so much trouble with a puny rat like the young man.

While the giant was down on his knees with the knife ready, the young man made a wide motion with his knife to give himself plenty of momentum. Then he moved the knife with blinding speed towards the neck. Successfully, the knife was cleanly jabbed through the neck. The young man exhaled deeply and released his grip from the knife. He felt relieved, thinking that the giant was finally incapacitated. He was proven wrong from the moment that he was unexpectedly elbowed in the stomach by the giant. The young man was winded from the blow as the giant turned around and grabbed the young man by his neck.

Being brought to the front, the young man became shocked in horror at seeing the giant's face convulsed in rage while the knife penetrated in his neck seemed to do nothing. Even where the knife met the skin, there was blood squeezing its way out between the skin and the knife. The giant was not unfazed at all by the knife wounds he sustained. His face began to turn a weird shade of purple but it wasn't enough to stop the giant from doing anything.

The giant proceeded to tighten his grip around the young man's neck as he made a very evil smile. He flared his teeth as he kept tightening and tightening his grip. The young man struggled to release himself from the enormous hand that surrounded his neck with both hands. But it wasn't enough for the young man; and at this rate, he won't be able to hold out before the giant would finally die.

The young man started to close his eyes as his body began to shut down. He ended up being in the worst possible situation that he imagined up for himself, which was death. He, of course, wasn't able to reflect in his mind what he could have done differently instead of following the brunette. At least he would no longer be up all night, thinking about what would happen to whoever was kidnapped. But yet, when he saw a damsel in distress, he wasn't able to take it any longer when he was just standing there. He felt he needed to take action. A moral impulse: that prepared his body for combat while holding back any desire to fall back. It was that same reckless, instinctive desire that pushed the young man onwards to challenge those bigger than he was. And now here he was, paying for his actions in reciprocity.

In his last moments of vision, the young man saw the knife being taken out of the giant's neck. He had seen the blade that was covered in blood and tissue. But unfortunately, the young man was unable to discern the one who took out the serrated knife.


End file.
